


Facts About Cats

by Quoshara, speakmefair



Category: Alias Smith and Jones
Genre: Bandits & Outlaws, Cats, Con Artists, Gen, Western
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-14
Updated: 2011-10-14
Packaged: 2017-10-24 15:09:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/264893
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quoshara/pseuds/Quoshara, https://archiveofourown.org/users/speakmefair/pseuds/speakmefair
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cats. Thoughts of bananas. Idiocy. Dust. Written for hardboiledbaby, as a much-belated birthday present.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Facts About Cats

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hardboiledbaby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hardboiledbaby/gifts).



Miss Ida Beth and Miss Amalee were not natives to the town of Blackstone River. They had come there after the death of their father, still wearing their weeds, dainty linen hankies neatly at hand to dab lingering tears off of parchment-skinned cheeks. They had rented a tidy house at the edge of the quiet, too-dusty town where they then settled down to the endeavor that had brought them to that out of the way hamlet in the first place. Cats.

Blackstone River had an enormous population of cats, cats that were tame and cats that were feral and cats that were furrily everything in between. There were house cats and barn cats and stable cats and saloon cats. There were cats in gardens and cats in the street and cats that sat outside the grocery store and even a cat that lived in the bank. At one time there had been a public movement to rename the town to Catsburg, but it had been voted down by a narrow margin.

So Miss Ida Beth and Miss Amalee, being the large-hearted cat lovers that they were, had moved to Blackstone River to use their father's legacy to improve the lot of the town's furrier residents. But, being the respectable and retiring type of female, they weren't quite sure the best way to go about it – as everyone they had spoken to knew to their time-consuming cost. They had advertised, therefore, in the County Record for a business manager.

The fact that they felt rather strongly about just what a business manager should _look like_ \-- since it seemed rather pointless hiring one who couldn't provide a pleasant view -- as opposed to what he could actually _do_ , was making the whole process rather lengthy. There seemed to be an amazing number of would-be business managers that even a full day's immersion in soapy water wouldn't improve.

It was just this attitude that had Kyle and Wheat up to their necks in hot water, in a literal sense this time, rather than in their usual just being in trouble way. Hot water and soap suds and even a shave.

The whole experience had Wheat shuddering, "I know why you gotta get cleaned up, but why'd you have ta drag me into it?"

There really wasn't a sane answer to that one, even if Kyle could have thought of a possibility that touched on said mental acquaintance with what people who weren't them assumed to be a default state.

"A respectable man needs respectable friends…and those respectable ladies expect respectable," Kyle growled, hoping the overflow of respectability would drown out Wheat's questions.

"And soap?" This, apparently, was the major sticking point. "I mean, can't you just _give_ them soap?"

"Er."

Kyle had seen the men that the ladies had turned down, some of them not even making it past the front door of the tidy little house. He'd heard the men grumbling about it, down at the saloon. That was what had given him the idea for this whole thing. Two elderly rich females with more money than sense just wanting to put their money to good use. As Kyle figured it, 'good use' would be lining his pockets.

They needed money, it was a pretty harmless scam (even if it did involve cats, which -- ugh) and it was going to be a piece of cake if they could just....fit the description. Which. Really, really did seem like the stupidest idea he'd had for a while, now that he was trying it out for size, and flavoring it with soap up his nose, and soap in his ears, and soap where – well, where he was pretty sure nothing, not even soap, should be.

"Look, Wheat. I'm the brains here, so just get washed and don't give me no more grief," and with that Kyle ducked his head down under the water to drown out any further complaints.

The effect of a small tidal wave that saturated most of the room told him without having to even look in the right direction that at least he had been listened to. He just had to not think about whether he was going to get revenged at for this, sometime later on when it could really be a problem.

**

"So, what do you think? Cold beer, hot bath, clean bed?" Kid asked as they rode into town.

"I think," Heyes said with a big grin, "that you're reading my mind again."

"And I wasn't even trying!" It was a bit difficult to tell whether Kid was genuinely impressed with himself, or playing the tried-and-tested game of 'how far can I wind Heyes up before he notices what I'm doing?'

"Uh-oh."

"Oh, don't worry, Heyes, I promise not to do it when we're playing poker."

"No," Heyes frowned distractedly, "I mean 'Uh-oh' like that…" He pointed down the street at exhibits A, horribly clean and washed and sober, and walking as much out of the all-pervasive dust as they could. The boards might never be the same again, because God forbid the stupid bastards could take off their spurs....

Kid's expression turned into something mid-way between a stifled sneeze and pure disbelief. "I wish I wasn't seeing this..."

"They've gotta be up to something," Heyes shook his head.

"Aw, Heyes, you don't know that. Maybe they're just here for a rest, just like us."

"Now, Kid," Heyes always thought he sounded like the world's most annoying old man when he did that, but _seriously_ , if there was ever anyone who needed an annoying old man to pull him right and put him straight, it was Kid Curry, "you've known Kyle and Wheat just as long as I have. Barring that one time we visited Wheat's Granny, how often have you seen them get cleaned up if they didn't have to?"

"Well, yeah, but...maybe they had to again? The hotel might've made them...." Hopeless optimism ran out mid-way. "Yeah, you're right."

They dismounted, tied their horses up in front of the saloon and crept (dustily and not very stealthily and with a fair amount of quiet coughed cursing) after their two former partners, catching up with them just as they reached the small clapboard house.

They couldn't get close enough to hear the words that were exchanged on the front stoop, but after Kyle and Wheat had gone inside, they ducked into the bushes beneath window which, conveniently, opened into the room that the two men were directed to. Not only could they hear everything, but could also sneak peeks through the greenery, even if what they mostly saw was moving blinds and the occasional glimpse of material.

"Nice place you ladies got here." They heard Kyle make a horrible attempt at charm. It sounded like cold grease on a winter's day in a left-out frying pan.

Heyes put a hand over his eyes and shook his head slowly. It was like watching a train head for a cliff edge, in the same sickly fascinating way that was going nowhere good very fast. He was incredibly glad that, what with the closed eyes and his hand covering them, he couldn't see Kid's expression. It would probably have been the last straw.

"It's a little small," Miss Ida Beth said, "but we like it."

"Yes," agreed Miss Amalee, "it may not be as big as the home our dear departed father…"

"God rest his soul," Miss Ida Beth interjected solemnly.

"…provided for us. But our needs are much simpler now that he passed on."

Heyes kept his eyes resolutely shut as the dialogue from hell continued -- a dialogue with four participants, two of whom were obviously struck dumb. He thought it might be with horror.

"We wouldn't expect you to live in --"

"Oh dear, no, so terribly inappropriate, and Father --"

"-- God rest his soul --"

" -- would never have allowed it."

"Er," said Kyle, brilliantly. Beside Heyes, Kid was shaking with silent laughter.

"Oh, of course," Miss Amalee laughed.

"Oh, Amee, we are silly kittens, aren't we?" Miss Ida Beth joined in the laughter. "It's like this, young man, our father—"

"—God rest his soul—"

"—God rest his soul, left us a considerable amount of money. Money that we would like to turn towards good works. In this case, the good work we have chosen is cats."

That did it. Not being blessed with the magic powers of enforced, teeth-gritted calm that a hand over the eyes could grant Heyes, Kid leant slowly, unstoppably sideways and unhelpfully bit Heyes' jacket in an effort not to laugh out loud.

He got skin with it, and Heyes contemplated violence, trying not to yell.

"Cats," Kyle said calmly. Too calmly, leading Heyes to believe that he must have already known about it.

"Yes. The poor dears."

"Poor dears," Miss Amalee echoed. "So many of them in this town and no one to care for them. They fight over scraps and some of them just outright starve."

"Very sad." Wheat chimed in. He sounded like he meant it, and oh _God_ , wasn't that a thought for the ages.

Some leaves that didn't smell all that good were trying very hard to stick up Heyes's nose. He ignored them, manfully.

"So, what you want is someone to handle arrangements for you? To hire someone to feed the cats, maybe help tame the kittens so you can find them good homes?" Kyle had obviously given a lot of thought to just what the ladies wanted.

Heyes tried very hard indeed not to think of Kyle and Wheat taming kittens. It was a bit like trying not to think of the word banana.

"Oh _could_ you?" Miss Amalee sounded both wistful and as though she had entirely forgotten just why she was talking to them in the first place. "That would be such a help."

"It _would_ ," Miss Ida Beth, hitherto seeming to be possessed of more sense than her sister, agreed with a horrible kind of longing.

"It'd be a pleasure, ma'am." Kyle continued. "It's going to take quite a bit of money though, you know, to get this set up."

"Oh, we know." Miss Amalee agreed quickly. "But rest assured that we have the means to do it."

Miss Ida Beth nodded as if making up her mind, "And that money will all be given into your governance, Mr. Kyle…as soon as you agree to one little concession."

If that had been him, Heyes knew, he would have been swamped with a feeling of doom, because one little concession was never, _never_ as little as someone wanted to make it out to be. He was pretty much living proof of that as it was.

"What would that be, ma'am?"

"Our dear departed father—"

"—God rest his soul—" Wheat chimed in.

"Yes." Miss Amalee's whole voice turned into a smile, as she audibly beamed at him. "Well, he didn't have much faith in our judgment."

"Rightly so, we must admit," Miss Ida Beth continued. "So, he made us promise that if we were to turn our finances over to anyone after his death, that they would have to put up some earnest money of their own."

"Earnest money?" Heyes could almost hear Kyle gulp.

"Oh… it's only a thousand dollars. Not a trifle, I know, but considering we'll be turning over fifty thousand to your care, it seems quite reasonable."

" _A thousand dollars?_ " Kid mouthed the words at Heyes, then curled back up like a giggling hedgehog. Heyes reminded himself that the sound of someone being smacked repeatedly over the head would carry in through the window just as well as the conversation going on inside was travelling out, and restrained himself.

There was a silence from inside in which the sound of very slowly processing and rather rusty cogs trying to grind their way to a coherent and believable thought travelled as clearly as voices.

"Oh...yeah… very reasonable." Kyle answered.

"But Kyle…" Wheat started.

"I said very reasonable." Kyle must by now have been scowling at Wheat, judging by the warning snap to his voice. "But it's not like we have that kind of money just laying around, ladies. You'll have to give us a day or two to get the money transferred to the local bank."

"Oh, of course," Miss Ida Beth said quickly.

"That's also very reasonable," Miss Amalee agreed. "We'll expect your return when you've made all your arrangements."

It appeared that the interview was over. Heyes looked around to be sure they wouldn't be seen from the door when Kyle and Wheat stepped out.

"Oh… Can I ask a question?" Wheat's drawl drifted out to them. "I know you ladies like cats and all, but I don't see nary a one here in your house."

"Oh…that." Miss Ida Beth sighed. "It's the saddest thing of all. Poor Amee has the most horrible reaction to the dear little things."

"I do." Miss Amalee continued. "I swell right up whenever there's one in the room. And I do so love them."

It was Heyes's turn to have to smother laughter. Because _of course_.

**

It wasn't until later, cold beers drunk, baths taken and the two of them stretched out on clean sheets that Kid finally asked the important question.

"Heyes, you don't think there's any way that Kyle and Wheat could come up with that thousand dollars do you?"

It was a nasty little thought that he'd been trying really hard to avoid, because seriously, there were a lot of ways they could get (however temporarily) the money -- and _none_ of those ways were good ones.

"I'm not sure," Heyes admitted. The bed was clean, and smelled washed, but it had odd little lumps in the mattress that he was pretty sure were springs trying to escape. Every time he moved, they made little bids to get more painful. He forced himself to stay still. "I doubt they have it. Well, not just the two of them, for sure. If the rest of the gang's around some place, they might _just_ have enough. But even that's a stretch of the imagination."

"Good." Kid nodded, snuggling down in the bed. Apparently he was unbothered by the odd moving lumps. Then again, the windows could be open, a gale blowing through with added unseasonal hail, and Kid usually managed to sleep on right through it, so Heyes wasn't really surprised. "I'd hate to see them cheat those two nice old ladies."

"Of course, they could just decide to rob the bank and get it direct."

"Oh, you had to say that, didn't you?" It was a sort of drawn-out moan rather than a coherent sentence, but it was still pretty easy to understand.

"You're the one who asked." Heyes grinned to himself, and reached up to extinguish the lamp.

"So what do we do now?" came the inevitable question in the gloom.

What Heyes really wanted to do, and pretty much immediately, was to stop thinking of the word banana, or indeed Wheat and Kyle taming kittens, or God, so desperately much, Kyle and Wheat taming kittens while _repeating_ the word banana, but there was no way he was going to admit that out loud.

"See what happens?" he suggested a bit hopelessly.

"Yeah… because we're both so good at that," Kid laughed. "G'night, Heyes."

Heyes grunted something that might, if someone was stone deaf and in a charitable mood, be taken for a response, and folded his arms behind his head, waiting for sleep.

It was an oddly long time in coming.

**

The next morning came too bright and too early for all concerned – for Kyle and Wheat and the rest of the Hole in the Wall Gang in their camp outside of town, and for Kid and Heyes in their cozy hotel room.

Kyle and Wheat, by a watering hole that really didn't merit the appellation, were arguing with their gang about just how they were going to come up with the money they needed. Kid and Heyes had more leisure and more pleasantry, and a great deal more of linen tablecloths and good furniture, but also more worry about just what the other two were up to.

"They aren't our responsibility anymore." Kid took a bite of his biscuits and gravy in punctuation, and scowled at Heyes.

Watching someone try to look determined while chewing was not really a pleasant sight first thing in the morning. It involved a little more insight as to the masticatory process than Heyes felt anyone should really need to be given.

"I know they're not," Heyes agreed, trying not to look too hard at how biscuits and gravy were – mulched. "But if they get hauled in, that means the Law has in custody people who know just exactly what we look like. You wouldn't want all those Wanted Posters updated with more accurate descriptions, would you?"

"They wouldn't do that…" Kid looked up from his breakfast, swallowed (thankfully) and sighed. "Yeah, you're right. They would."

They would. Even if they didn't actually mean to, they would. They'd probably think it would impress someone, somewhere, and go on about it for ever.

Heyes wondered if there was any way of getting his brain to just stop.

 _Banana_ , it offered helpfully.

Kid took a drink of his coffee and then looked at Heyes. "So what do we do? "

"I guess about the only thing we can do is warn off the ladies." Heyes shrugged. "If they listen then there won't be any need for Kyle and Wheat to come up with the money."

It was amazing how someone could look quite that crushed, disappointed, and resigned without even trying.

"Awww, Heyes…" If Kid had been twelve it would actually have been a whine. Even at his present age it was right on the borderline.

Heyes, who would very much have liked to join him, wondered why he always got stuck with being the responsible, non-whining adult.

They finished their breakfast, left the clean if airless confines of the hotel, and trudged, dustily and far more reluctantly then their previous journey, toward the sisters' home.

"You know, I keep thinking that we need to move out of the West," Kid ventured.

"Yeah, they do have old ladies back East...."

"And you'd make me visit 'em, too," Kid grumbled.

They walked a bit further in silence.

"But maybe it would be easier? Not so many people know us there." Kid continued. "We could just disappear into the crowds and come back when we think enough time has passed for the Governor to grant our amnesty. Just think of it… a bed every night. No more trail drives and dust… no more gang to babysit…"

Heyes, who could think of several rather satisfying ways that they could end up with the same result in regards to the gang, tactfully kept silent and reminded himself that murder was not on his list of things to do.

Unfortunately.

"No more bad food and worse beer and rotgut watered down whiskey..."

Oh yeah, Kid was on a roll. It was almost soothing.

"Don't you think?"

Heyes, who had lost the thread of the conversation several blocks back, just blinked slowly before he replied. "They don't carry guns in Philadelphia, y'know. And you'd have to get a regular job, with regular hours, some place _inside_."

And that, (thank _God_ ) seemed to be the end of that. For now. Heyes had no illusions as to the thoughtful silence's longevity, and was duly relieved when they got to the house before anyone had a chance to break it – and yes, he was including himself in that gratitude, because he was seriously afraid of what kind of tirade he might unwittingly spark off with his next innocuous remark.

When they reached the little house, with its weathered boards and new if rather dusty paint, and the slightly-warped porch that surely should have been replaced by now, it was almost a relief.

Kid knocked sharply on the front door, removing his hat and standing up straight. That was a move that always made Heyes smile. You could take the boy out of the orphanage, but you never got rid of the manners that were drilled into him.

The door opened and a smiling, wrinkled face peered out. "May I help you?"

And there went the innocuous remark that was bound to completely derail every helpful thought from its path.

"We sort of thought we might be able to help you?" Kid proffered, sounding a bit lost. It was hard to blame him.

"Oh, are you here about the advertisement? Oh, goodness. Oh, I am sorry. Have you come a very long way?" she asked with concern, looking between them.

"Er," said Kid, completely flummoxed, and Heyes felt his hand twitching to come up and hide his face again while he got some sort of composure back behind it.

"No ma'am," Kid found his voice. "I mean, no, we haven't come far, but we're not here about the advertisement. At least not directly."

The woman – Heyes wasn't sure which sister she was, but he thought from the rather fluttery demeanor that it was probably Miss Amalee – stepped back and opened the door. "P'rhaps you'd best come in and explain yourselves then."

 _And that's going to be a riot_ , Heyes thought gloomily, as he took his hat off, offered his best smile, and stepped into the bright hallway.

It smelled, of course, of lavender sachet and wax polish, and even the stripes of sunlight, coming in through the blinded windows, were free of the all-pervasive dust-motes.

**

"Sister," the old lady, who they had discovered was indeed Miss Amalee, called out as they entered the parlor, "we have guests."

"Yes, Amee?" Miss Ida Beth stood up, smoothing down her skirts as she turned toward the door.

"These nice young men have come about the business manager job."

"Oh… I'm so sorry," Miss Ida Beth said, and actually looked it. "We've already hired someone. And Mr. Kyle seems to suit us right down to the ground, too."

"Yes, he does. And he seems so tenderhearted about the poor kitties too."

 _I am not thinking about kittens and bananas. I am not, I am not._ Heyes was truly suffering. Mostly from the need to sit down and have a good laugh and get it all out of his system.

"Yeah, he loves kitties – I mean cats. I mean, yeah, he's – it's just --" Under normal circumstances, Kid looking this completely hopeless would be funny. When Heyes couldn't think of two coherent words to string together, it was slightly less so.

"Oh," Miss Amalee interrupted him. "Are you two friends of Mr. Kyle and Mr. Wheat? How nice. Isn't that nice, Ida?"

"Very nice," Ida agreed. "And it's quite possible that he might want to hire some extra help once we get everything underway. I'll give him your names, Mister?"

 _Please, please, please don't get honest. Really,_ Heyes thought, and wished he would seem less utterly obnoxious if he cut in right then. As it was, he was reduced to thinking rather desperately in Curry's direction and coming very close to praying.

"Thaddeus Jones, ma'am," Kid managed to say without hesitation. "And this is my partner, Joshua Smith."

There was a knock on the front door, interrupting any further revelations.

"Oh my, Ida. What a busy day we're having." Miss Amalee scurried out of the parlor to answer the front door.

"Oh, what?" Kid was looking justifiably smug.

"Nope. Not saying a word."

"Yeah, I kinda noticed...."

The start of a glare-fest was interrupted by the entrance of Miss Amalee and the new visitors, the sight of whom made Heyes's hand twitch all over again. As it was, he fought a losing battle not to close his eyes and groan.

Kyle was similarly surprised his eyes going wide when he saw them standing in the parlor, "Hey---?! Oh… Hey, it's good to see you, Joshua… Thaddeus. What are you boys doin' here?"

"We thought a heads-up might be in order," Heyes said obscurely, and was pleased to see a faint twitch in response.

"A heads up about what?" Miss Amalee looked almost as intent as some of the city's small inhabitants, her curiosity piqued.

"Oh… it's nothing important, ma'am," Kid told her. "Just some old business that we need to discuss."

 _Yeah, like how we'd like to bury you,_ Heyes thought, not feeling remotely guilty, smiled indiscriminately around him, and moved past Miss Amalee to usher the unwanted cat-wranglers out onto the dry street where they stood a chance of at least only being heard in faint and unconnected little snatches.

It was a relief to have the excuse to put his hat on again. Being unshaded was a hell of a thing.

"What are you doing?" Kyle whisper-hissed as he found himself outside.

"You are NOT going to take money from those sweet little old ladies," Kid groused.

"Yeah, we are, cause of gettin' some," was Wheat's unhelpful contribution. There was a round of universal blinking.

"He means we got some from the bank," Kyle said a bit tiredly.

"You robbed a –" Heyes felt his voice spiralling upwards into a shout, and clamped down on it. "When did you get the time to rob a bank?" he hissed.

"We _didn't_ , they gave it us!" Wheat squawked, and that –

Yeah, that made no sense at all, even with thinking about it.

"Banks don't just hand out money for no reason," Kid interjected.

"Well, no…" Kyle looked at Wheat with a grin.

"Nah…we had to sign for it." Wheat broke out in whoops of laughter.

"Huh?" was Kid's oh-so helpful contribution.

"Yeah, we went in –"

"And this old guy –"

"The bank teller, you know, wears a suit, he said, he said –"

"Oh, I've been expecting you, he said."

"So we went in and signed stuff, and we got this money. And now we're going to give it her and then we'll get their money and then –"

"You'll go away?" Heyes said hopefully. "I mean – no! This is –" He wasn't really very sure what it was. "A really terrible idea?" he finished wanly.

"Well, me and Kyle think it's a great idea, " Wheat drawled, his eyes narrowing. "And that you two should just butt out."

"Yeah," Kyle agreed. "We've had this conversation before, haven't we? You keep outta our business and we'll keep outta yours."

"Yeah, except for where you –" Kid stopped mid-sentence and stared at them. "Wait a bit. How come the old guy –"

"Bank teller –" Heyes couldn't stop himself from adding, and saw Kid's hand twitch upwards with longing to smack him one –

"Yeah, _anyway_ , how come he was expecting you?"

"Aw, he got a telegram, tellin' him..."

The large, hovering feeling of _oh shit_ dropped onto Heyes with asphyxiating weight.

"Listen…" Kid scrubbed his hand over his face in frustration. "Doesn't that seem just a little bit too much of a coincidence? You need a thousand dollars and then suddenly the bank teller has a cable giving him your description and he just signs over the exact amount you need?"

"No, Kid. I don't call that coincidence. I call that our luck being good for once." Kyle was starting to get angry, which was sort of understandable.

"Yeah, except of how you don't got any."

Heyes, overwhelmed with bad grammar and bad luck, gave in to temptation and put his hand over his face.

"Fine. Fine. " Heyes interrupted. "You want us to back off? We're backing off."

"Heyes? What—"

"We're backing off, Kid…now."

"Right." Kid's scowl almost made Heyes's skin itch.

"Come on, Kid."

Kid was silent until they were half-way down the street, "Are we really going to let them do this, Heyes?"

"Yes, we are."

"But they're gonna –"

Heyes smiled, slowly and nastily. "Yeah," he agreed. "And _I_ am going to watch. And maybe laugh. And if it all goes well, I am going to warn them about little old ladies for ever and ever and ever."

Kid gave a huff of laughter.

"And if…" Heyes continued, "…if they somehow manage to do the impossible and actually get away with it? Well, I'm thinking it won't be too hard to steal the money back from them."

He hoped those wouldn't be his famous last words.

**

As it turned out, they weren't. Mostly, he hated to admit, because of the cats.

It turned out that even little old ladies who wanted their father –

"God rest his soul," Kid always piously interjected at this point of story telling, and always got a slap across the back of the head for saying –

\--to have just made it all simple and left them the money straight out, without need for – well, kinda seducing men (in a strictly business-like way, 'course) to be the names behind the put-in money they needed ("And it's only a thousand dollars, Ida Beth!" "Yes, dear, and we can put that straight in along with a telegram telling that lovely bank man who to expect,") – well, even sweet old dears like that turned out to give in when faced with the knowledge that getting the money would –

Would…

(And here Kid always cracked up.)

Would force the town to get rid of most of the cats by tidying it up.

It turned out that the ladies had actually chosen Blackstone River as a place for financial opportunity. It had, as their Sainted father – God rest his soul, or at least do something with his soul, perhaps get it to leave all conversation forever more – would have said, "Potential with a capital P." A rail line with a scheduled stop, plans for a new hotel, and the advantage of good land nearby that was still available for homesteading. All that, in addition to the dear little cats that the two sisters truly did want to help.

Unfortunately they had one major oversight. Once they had tricked Kyle and Wheat into collecting the thousand dollars – as their dear papa's will ("God rest his soul." "Shut up, Kid.") had set forth as a test of their ingenuity – they would receive the rest of their funds. Unfortunately, they then discovered that a major part of the town's updating and beautifying, which they would have to include in order to make money, was to get rid of all the sweet little cats.

"And we couldn't have that, could we, Amee?"

"No, dear," her sister always agreed, with a great deal more regret.

The money went back to the bank. It probably earned interest. The dear old ladies at least replaced their porch, and bought themselves an incredibly smart buggy. They never got round to replacing their mysteriously disappearing managers.

Kyle and Wheat never saw their – well, they thought of it as their – money again.

And Heyes was never quite able to separate thoughts of bananas and kittens again as long as he lived.

**


End file.
